


A Hole in the Middle

by pendragonness



Series: 00Q mini series [2]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Bond has unnatural ways of understanding and dealing with emotion, M/M, but that's nothing new, mild depictions of violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-27
Updated: 2013-02-27
Packaged: 2017-12-03 18:52:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/701509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendragonness/pseuds/pendragonness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Another one of those Q-gets-kidnapped-and-Bond-freaks-out fics. But more vague, more about Bond's psyche, less romantic, more desperate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Hole in the Middle

James Bond had long since passed the point of being accustomed to fear. He slept with fear, breathed fear, his daily glasses of whiskey were made of it. Close on ten years he had spent in arms with fear, so that when a dark-eyed seductress with a smoky voice and heady accent warned him of a fear he had never felt - well, it was a miracle his only response was a wry smile. Fear meant nothing at this point, because he didn’t know what it was to exist without it.

This was not fear. Bond knew how fear smelt and tasted: it was that bitter edge to his morning coffee in response to being surprised he had lived through another night; it was the cold in the air as he waited for a fatal bullet to fly from an unseen window and pass straight through his skull; it was the discomfort of cold adrenaline every time his phone rang, always at the ready. But this - this was the sensation of missing something vital, something you needed to survive, and a fruitless, hopeless search to retrieve it. This was staying awake in the darkness of night, drenched with sweat and wrecked with nausea. This was water in the lungs and sand in the eyes and gas in the air. This was terror. And this frightened him.

-

How and why was irrelevant by now. Duration was what mattered: MI6’s Quartermaster had been missing for nine days, which was four days longer than it should have ever been. Should have never been.

This was nausea and adrenaline and wasted bullets that led to wrong answers and a wake of bodies. This was being hollow inside but feeling more alive than ever before. This was terror.

-

Duration was all that mattered. Twelve and a half days. Twelve and a half days, at 3:47PM, and terror swelled exponentially inside of the double-oh agent, suffocating and blinding, as darkness rolled back to reveal a broken body he would recognize even if he were a different creature in a different life.

Bond scrambled forward with a lack of grace none had witnessed from him before, stumbling and falling beside the young body hanging feebly from chains at the wrists. This was metallic bile in the throat and an utter dismissal of finesse, a foreign sound choking from his throat, something astoundingly and painfully human.

He touched delicately at the thin body colored red and black and blue and brown. Nothing happened. He lurched back to his feet, the entire world pounding staccato. The young man held up by chains looked dead, skin an unearthly white where it wasn’t discolored, eyes closed gently, breathing nigh impossible to detect. Bond was barely aware of roaring for help, a medic, help, someone, something. This was a tremble of uselessness.

He could not let the chains down, not on his own and not without causing the unconscious Quartermaster even more pain. He had to stand and do nothing. He trembled and felt sick; this was weak, for him. This was something he couldn’t control. Bond roared again, demanding attention and aid, quickly, faster, now.

His fingers found their way delicately - still trembling - into dark, sweaty, bloody hair. A delicate and tender motion, just a feeble attempt to tidy the young man’s appearance - no, that was bullshit; it was for him, because he was selfish and alone and fucking _scared_ , and he needed to touch. One hand stroked and smoothed hair, the other so very softly touched Q’s swollen cheek, hot palm just barely grazing sweat-cooled, mottled skin. The younger man was practically soaked in blood of varying freshness, and Bond knew he would be covered in the horrible color himself just from these small touches. He felt the sickness come again, a fresh wave of suffocation. He was touching and caressing and praying to something he didn’t believe in for a response, but nothing came. This was a nightmare he would never escape.

Footsteps pattered, several, and quickly, although he was sure they could have come faster. He was shoved back, pulled back, restrained by unknown hands and bodies as exhausted instinct overruled any sense of understanding, and the agent savagely rebelled against peoples other than himself going near the Quartermaster. He was pulled back so they could swoop in, the chains were lowered, someone was shouting at him that it was okay, they were taking the MI6 kid to a medical ward, they were going to fly him out immediately, they just had to get him out of the chains - meaningless words that fell on deaf ears as Bond heard a muffled yelp that he could feel in his bones as belonging to Q, and then a short whimper that chilled his blood. He snarled, raging like a wildcat to protect its young, but was held fast and forced to watch as a handful of MI6 agents and medics carried away a feeble stretcher laden with far more feeble cargo. 

007 was released, and he stumbled at the sudden lack of resistance around him. He was watched for a moment, until something in his eyes threatened savagely enough that the men nodded at each other and left, only one offering up the information that a truck would be waiting outside when he was ready.

Footsteps faded away and there was nothing left but dark and cold and empty chains with blood and urine and other fluids staining the cement beneath them. This was horror.

Bond wasn’t aware of his body collapsing until his knees cracked a little painfully against the cement, and his palms connected with cold stone and a spot of still-fresh blood. The tremble was a shake now, and as he rocked back on his heels, still kneeling, the shake became a sob. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think, hear, smell, taste, he couldn’t be sure he was actually alive. Twelve and a half days of terror. There wasn’t even a guarantee the nightmares were over - perhaps all efforts had been futile, and his Quartermaster would not even survive to the hospital. Those chances were higher than the chance of life.

This was him being realistic. But he didn’t want his Quartermaster to be dead. That was the reality. He had tried, tried so hard, and for it to have all been futile was unfeasible. Visions raced behind his eyes of what Q might have endured - pains that he himself had likely experienced before and knew well, but pains the young man should never have even dreamed of. Bond was the field agent. He was the one to be hung by the wrists by chains and beaten and carved open. Not his Quartermaster. This was guilt, and it was as sickening as the terror. It made him cold and hateful and his eyes burned.

Another one of those sounds tore from his throat, that savagely human sound of pain and terror and it was a sob he only allowed to escape that once more, the back of his hand pressed against his mouth, eyes hot and blurred and their salt water spilling onto his skin. Bond closed them tight, feeling a few final tears escape, kept his hand pressed against his mouth, whimpered once - and shakily inhaled, convincing himself that was the last time. This was horror and guilt and relief.

And maybe something else.


End file.
